I have been using Mobilism for some years to download e-books but started posting just recently. The website was highlighted to me by an author writing in the Guardian newspaper who felt his royalties were being filched by the uploaders on this website. Little did he know he was introducing another reader to the joys of online piracy.

The main problem that I find with this site is that the books are hosted on very unreliable file-hosting platforms that are rife with malware/adware and worst of all, delete the file on a whim. This makes a mockery of the uploader who has put in the hard-work of sourcing, de-DRM'ing and uploading the book and the grateful readers who brave the high seas of online adware and malware simply to access new knowledge and experiences.

In fact, I created this new account (I forgot the password to my old one), simply so that I could contact uploaders, make them aware of their expired releases and hopefully cajole them into re-uploading their precious cargo.

While this approach may be successful once or twice, I recently had a case where the uploader completely ignored my message. He is a regular so it's not that he is not aware of my message. It's a hassle to re-upload things and a file, once uploaded, should remain so for posterity so that generations of online pirates may benefit from the hard work of a single uploader and share it widely.

In any case, the point I am trying to make is that Mobilism is simply too high-quality and excellent a resource to have to rely on these puny, unknown and adware-serving file-hosting services in order to deliver the goods.

Thus, my suggestions are as follows:

1) Use Mega.nz. I admit, I am not an experienced user of this platform but I have found it works very well for file-sharing. A user can simply create a throwaway account or even a regular account and upload whatever he likes. I think a free account gets you 50 GB of storage which should be more than enough for our needs as e-books take up no space at all. There are no ads and the service is very privacy-minded.

2) Upload your books to Library Genesis (libgen.io). Library Genesis is of course the mother of online e-books and I get most of my books from there. I have never understood why the users of Mobilism don't mirror their uploads on Library Genesis. Lib Gen doesn't serve malicious ads and the files remain alive. Whatever the magic recipe for avoiding take down notices seems to be, Lib Gen has perfected it. Whenever I find a book on Mobilism that is not available on Lib Gen, I make sure to upload it there. This ensures its survival for a longer period and the fact that it reaches a wider audience which further ensures its life online. Sometimes, the Lib Gen uploader does not work, so I use its mirror, b-ok.org.

Thus, in conclusion, uploading our files to mega.nz and mirroring them on Library Genesis should ensure our files stay alive longer and reach a wider audience thus benefitting all concerned in our global search for knowledge, enrichment and entertainment.

dubbledibble wrote:Thus, in conclusion, uploading our files to mega.nz and mirroring them on Library Genesis should ensure our files stay alive longer and reach a wider audience thus benefitting all concerned in our global search for knowledge, enrichment and entertainment.

I too love HEA endings, but this one will never happen. First, if you were a real poster on this site and had struggled to keep your links alive since day one, burning host after host and having your accounts (not just your links) deleted for violation of terms, you would give anything for such Happy Ever After, for a way to leave your 'legacy for posterity'. No filehost deletes files on a whim, they do it only after they receive DMCA take-down notices. In other words, they delete for "violation of terms".

Second, if you take a look at the General Site Rules, you will find that only links to direct download sites are allowed. Not storage services for private files and not Libraries Genesis of any kind, but actual filehosts. And keep in mind that those filehosts are businesses, not NGOs. They need to make money to survive and not waste their storage space on inactive files, so most of them delete the links after a period of inactivity. Not a whim either. But by all means, let us know the names of those miracle sites that never delete links so we can all turn to them as one!

dubbledibble wrote: I admit, I am not an experienced user of this platform but I have found it works very well for file-sharing.

This is the problem, maybe if you asked the experienced users of this site how many accounts they have lost on host sites including Mega, the answer would surprise and shock you. But it might help you to finally understand how this all works

dubbledibble wrote:Thus, in conclusion, uploading our files to mega.nz and mirroring them on Library Genesis should ensure our files stay alive longer and reach a wider audience thus benefitting all concerned in our global search for knowledge, enrichment and entertainment.

I too love HEA endings, but this one will never happen. First, if you were a real poster on this site and had struggled to keep your links alive since day one, burning host after host and having your accounts (not just your links) deleted for violation of terms, you would give anything for such Happy Ever After, for a way to leave your 'legacy for posterity'. No filehost deletes files on a whim, they do it only after they receive DMCA take-down notices. In other words, they delete for "violation of terms".

Second, if you take a look at the General Site Rules, you will find that only links to direct download sites are allowed. Not storage services for private files and not Libraries Genesis of any kind, but actual filehosts. And keep in mind that those filehosts are businesses, not NGOs. They need to make money to survive and not waste their storage space on inactive files, so most of them delete the links after a period of inactivity. Not a whim either. But by all means, let us know the names of those miracle sites that never delete links so we can all turn to them as one!

dubbledibble wrote: I admit, I am not an experienced user of this platform but I have found it works very well for file-sharing.

This is the problem, maybe if you asked the experienced users of this site how many accounts they have lost on host sites including Mega, the answer would surprise and shock you. But it might help you to finally understand how this all works

I don't understand. Why are people prevented from uploading their files to Library Genesis?

dubbledibble wrote:I don't understand. Why are people prevented from uploading their files to Library Genesis?

Why can't the rule be changed?

There is nothing in the rules that says that posters cannot also upload their files to Library Genesis in addition to posting them on this site.

There is, however, a rule that the links provided on this site must be to filehosts with direct download links. Library Genesis is a search engine that allows access to contents and their servers simply could not cope with the number of users we generate as they are not set up for that kind of traffic, where a filehost's servers are specifically made for heavy traffic.

Sep 1st, 2017, 6:54 pm

... a mind needs books as a sword needs a whetstone if it is to keep its edge.― George R.R. Martin

dubbledibble wrote:I don't understand. Why are people prevented from uploading their files to Library Genesis?

Why can't the rule be changed?

There is nothing in the rules that says that posters cannot also upload their files to Library Genesis in addition to posting them on this site.

There is, however, a rule that the links provided on this site must be to filehosts with direct download links. Library Genesis is a search engine that allows access to contents and their servers simply could not cope with the number of users we generate as they are not set up for that kind of traffic, where a filehost's servers are specifically made for heavy traffic.

Thank you. It's somewhat of a relief to receive a reasonable and level-headed response.

I do not wish to nitpick but Libgen.io receives more visitors than Mobilism. The Alexa rank of the former is 1,983 whilst that of the latter is 5,704. Library Genesis also has many mirrors and hosts Sci-Hub. It seems like a pretty comprehensive service. As far as I can tell, they want people to upload books.

You seem to be suggesting that a newly uploaded book would cause a sudden spike in traffic from Mobilism users that would paralyse Library Genesis. But many of the books here have a limited readership. Take the book "The First Firangis" by Jonathan Gill Harris. How many people would be interested in this book at the very same moment? Not that many I would wager. People could come to this book and others like it months or years later, like I did. I doubt there would be a frenzy to download this book at the very same moment all over the world which is what brings down online services. Game of Thrones this is not.

I have been using Library Genesis for some years now and it has rarely suffered an outage. I doubt the bibliophiles of Mobilism could bring it down. The entire publishing establishment of the Western world has tried and failed.

Please consider allowing or encouraging users to post their files on Library Genesis in addition to direct download sites. If the administrators of Library Genesis complain, we can always stop.

Finally, what do you make of Mega.nz? I think it is a good service and ought to meet the direct download criteria so stringently demanded by the makers of Mobilism.

dubbledibble wrote:I do not wish to nitpick but Libgen.io receives more visitors than Mobilism.

<snip>

Finally, what do you make of Mega.nz? I think it is a good service and ought to meet the direct download criteria so stringently demanded by the makers of Mobilism.

Actually, you do mean to nitpick, but I understand you are quite passionate about this.

That doesn't change the fact that the rules are not going to change to allow Library Genesis as a download site because it is not a direct download filehost. Many of the admin and mods on Mobilism have been with this site since its inception and, based on their years of experience, have made the decision to only allow that type of site for links.

As I said before, the uploaders always have the option to post their files there as well as here but they cannot use it as a download link on their post here.

Every poster...for that matter every downloader...has their own personal preferences for filehosts and reasons why they like or dislike them. As an example, while you've had positive experiences at Library Genesis, my own have not been as positive. Invariably, with every visit I get at least one "exceeds maximum current users" error and opening each link seems to take forever for me. So even if it was allowed and I wanted to upload a file to share, that site would not be one of my first hosting choices regardless of how long the links would stay valid.

Regarding Mega.nz: Since we have a worldwide audience, we cannot require a specific host to be utilized as it might be blocked by some countries - that is why we require a minimum of two links for each post at the time of posting. Mega.nz is used by some of our posters as a filehost - in fact, a quick search turned up over 1500 posts that utilize that site as a link - so at least a few of them do appear to like it. However, even Mega.nz is not without issues in terms of links being taken down, as many of those 1500 links are dead, and have the following image posted for them:

Cheers!

Sep 2nd, 2017, 4:23 am

... a mind needs books as a sword needs a whetstone if it is to keep its edge.― George R.R. Martin

Thank you all for your suggestion, but Library Genesis will not be accepted as one of the required links in any post. Whether or not they pay uploaders is irrelevant, or else sites like Zippyshare or Mediafire would not be allowed.

#3.1 Files for releases have to be uploaded either onto filehosts or direct links to the file provided. You are not allowed to link to another site which contains a further link towards the download. You must post your own links.

The problem with Mobilism is that there is no way to make reading rules/instructions/help topics mandatory, it would save us all a lot of time and trouble. But we appreciate your suggestions anyway

I would like to make one more suggestion for the improvement of this web site.

We should be allowed to send Private Messages to members in order to request specific books.

I don't see what harm that could do.

As of now, there seems to be this allergy towards receiving Private Messages requesting specific books (not from members but from the management team of this web site).

Oftentimes, requests for e-books in the public forum go ignored and one has to resort to private messaging.

It stands to reason that a member who has uploaded books by a certain author or about a specific subject would have access to more of the same. Why can't we PM this person?

It's a different matter if the member receiving such message finds them intrusive. They can ignore us or simply ask us to keep away, which we would be more than happy to do.

On the whole though, I cannot imagine that most people would find this behaviour troublesome.

After I uploaded a few books by a certain author, somebody privately requested me to find and upload one of his other books. I was more than happy to oblige.

Similarly, when one of my public requests did not receive a response, I PM'd one user who had uploaded books by this author asking if he had what I was looking for. He did and fulfilled my request.

Thus, I think Mobilism should retire that rule that stops us from PM'ing others to help fulfil requests. It can help foster a sense of community by increasing one-on-one and private interactions between members.

When uploading books, the "subject" bar in the "post a new topic" area often proves inadequate for the text that it actually needs to contain.

The subject bar is supposed to carry the title, author and format of the book. Even if we do not include the subtitle, which many books have, I have found that I am not able to include all the information required.

This leads one to abbreviate the title of the book leading to strange and silly subject lines.

Is there any way to increase the character limit of the subject bar?

Thanks.

bunnylips wrote: As per the Rules, subject lines must contain the title, complete author name, and the file format. Keep in mind the goal is to allow members to find the book if they search. Using abbreviations, incomplete words prevents proper searching and cannot be allowed.

To do this, you have to sometimes be creative to find something meaningful AND searchable.

The subject length cannot be increased as it has been optimized to work on every possible device that our members may use to browse the forum. If you use a laptop / desktop, you want more characters. If you are using a phone, for example an iphone 5, the 60 character limit is actually too many to be able to scroll comfortably.

dubbledibble wrote:I would like to make one more suggestion for the improvement of this web site.

We should be allowed to send Private Messages to members in order to request specific books.

I don't see what harm that could do.

As of now, there seems to be this allergy towards receiving Private Messages requesting specific books (not from members but from the management team of this web site).

I do love your enthusiasm and your willingness to help, but this puzzles me: why would you think we disallowed Private Requests if not for the improvement of this site? (Don't answer that, rhetorical question )

To respond to your suggestion, suffice to say that the prohibition was introduced because the management of this site had no choice but to address the hundreds of complaints from posters who did find 'this behaviour troublesome'. The posters whose Inboxes were already flooded with new links requests, which they must attend to mandatorily within a short period of time, found requests for books annoying and disruptive.

We are more than one million one hundred and forty-eight thousand members, each with specific needs and wishes —some of which you outlined very well, by the way— so I guess there is no need for me to do the math. I hope the reason behind that particular rule is clear now, it's actually the same reason for our many warnings against all forms of spam

*Please be civil and don't spam OPs inboxes with requests for new links. Always keep in mind that you are NOT the only person requesting but one among many! A good estimation would be to request per day as many as you can read (per day)

Also, please be civil and don't spam the Requests section by posting or bumping too many requests at a time. Read this post carefully: How to post a request (RULES)

Thank you for this thread. I have found over the years that 90% and upwards of the "ebooks" posted on Mobilism lead to garbage malware-ridden sites, popups that I've been infected with a virus, dead links, etc. Basically only about one in ten of the links I follow lead to actual ebooks.